


a little something under your skin

by weathervaanes



Series: where our heads lived and were [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Demon Stiles Stilinski, Emotional Constipation, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-19
Updated: 2013-10-19
Packaged: 2017-12-29 19:50:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1009381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/weathervaanes/pseuds/weathervaanes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>PREQUEL<br/>So you may have noticed that we make quite a few references to an incident with possession over at Dulcis Memoria? Well here it is! This is actually Alyssa's baby, which I jumped in on because I'm me, so all praise goes to her!!!</p>
            </blockquote>





	a little something under your skin

He clutches Derek’s hand where it’s held steady, palm pressed up to his chest, holding him in place as he thrusts into Stiles evenly. He knees ache and the steady, vicious pace is breaking him from the inside out and if he hadn’t just come, he would probably be crying, but as it is he can only concentrate on Derek and his movements inside and the way his chest presses sweaty and slick against his back.

Sex with Derek is always amazing. It’s hot and heady and makes him feel amazing. They haven’t been doing it for very long, less than a month, and it just keeps getting better. The first time was thick with romance and anticipation, Derek treating him like a king, loving his body and kissing him senseless—it was everything he’d ever wanted out of a first time. Now it’s different. Now, Stiles likes to think, he’s a seasoned professional at sex. Derek kisses him deeper, bites him with his blunt human teeth, fucks him like he’s made of sturdy stuff, like he’s not going to break, and Stiles appreciates it because it’s true. He isn’t going to break. And if Derek would just keep fucking him like this forever, he’d be so, so happy.

He wishes it would go on forever, because this is when it feels right between them, this is when Derek might love him. When they’re done and spent and the lights come on, everything goes back to undetermined-relationship time. But for now Derek is panting in his ear—no words, just raw sounds—and he’s falling apart and he’s his. Just for now.

Stiles comes just an instant before Derek and Stiles wishes he was on his back so he could reach up and wrap his arms around Derek’s neck and kiss him, because kisses with Derek in the middle of aftershocks are the best. Instead, Derek just shudders and grunts and his arms tighten a little from where they’re wrapped around Stiles’ middle, and Stiles is really warm from his second orgasm and happy about the nonexistence of a teenage refractory period. He’s happy. And from the way Derek is breathing against the back of his neck, he’s fairly certain Derek is happy too.

Stiles bites his lips when Derek pulls out and he shivers as Derek moves and leaves his damp back exposed to the chill of the A/C. He stretches out on the bed, making small noises of pleasure-pain as he stretches his knees. He’s waiting for Derek to come back, holding onto the last few seconds of magic before it all falls flat. “Don’t you want a nap?”

Derek is moving somewhere behind him, probably hunting his shoes. “I have to get back.”

Get back to what? he wants to ask. To the barely there walls of your burnt out house? Back to the empty nest where only Isaac occasionally crashes when he has the time? But he doesn’t ask. Because Stiles knows the real answer is “I have to get away”.

Stiles can’t help the twisting in his chest. It sucks—it hurts so much—but it’s involuntary. He knows it’s just a fact of their relationship that he… He feels more than Derek does. Derek’s never thought of him as something particularly special, and he may be attracted to Stiles, but that doesn’t mean there’s anything else there. Stiles tries to tell himself that that’s okay, that Derek will realize how he feels one day, but Stiles doesn’t actually know that.

“You could stay,” Stiles says, forcing himself not to sound too upset. He sits up, rolling over, and watches as Derek gets dressed. “My dad isn’t—he won’t be home for a while.”

Derek isn’t looking at him. Derek won’t stop shaking his head. “I have to figure out what that scent is, Stiles. That’s why I came here in the first place.”

Stiles closes his eyes and counts to five because that’s probably all the time he has. “Yeah, I’ll look into it.”

“I need that information, Stiles,” he sighs, and miracle of miracles, he looks at Stiles, or glares, as he says, “Whatever it is, it’s bad. And it’s…it’s just everywhere.”

Stiles throws the blankets off himself and enjoys the brief flash of something in Derek’s eyes when he’s exposed, but he climbs right out of bed and pulls on his sweatpants. “I said I’ll look into it.”

He’s the one looking away from Derek now and he can feel Derek’s eyes on his back as he moves towards his desk, but then they’re gone in the next instant and so is Derek. Out his window.

“Jerkface,” Stiles says to the air.

He goes into his databases just for something to do. He's already gathered everything that he could with the vague hints they have and everything he has he put together neat and ready. But it's not like Derek to ask. It's like Derek to come in and kiss him senseless and then demand, like he's stupid, like weird shit starts happening and he doesn't look it up just as fast. But the research is soothing and something always slips through the cracks so he makes himself do that.

And then it's there. It's sudden and disorienting and there.

He has no idea what's happening.

One minute he’s just sitting there, on his computer—because even if the pack’s research isn’t really complete it’s apparently the only thing he’s good for nowadays—and the next there’s this black smoke coming from somewhere and everything is small and dark and he can’t do anything. He sees everything that’s happening, watches his limbs move and his computer screen go dark from where his arm has turned off the monitor, but he isn’t actively doing any of it.

It’s kind of like the kanima paralytic. He can’t move, can only think, trapped in his head, except this time it’s worse by a factor of a million because there’s something else there. There’s something else inside his head with him, and it’s not very friendly.

“Stiles, huh?” his voice says, but he’s not controlling his vocal chords. “Interesting name. Much better than your real one—hope no one actually calls you that.”

He has no idea what to do. He can’t scream, can’t fight, can’t do anything. Just…wait.

Wait and pray and hope—because this is obviously the thing. This is obviously the thing that Derek asked him to research, obviously the brand new supernatural creature in Beacon Hills, and now it has him. Why do they always have him?

“Derek.” His voice. His voice—he will never get over the sound of his voice without his brainwaves connecting to his mouth, to his words. “Yes, I think that’s where we’ll start. He does seem rather fond of you—although, there’s Scott as well. Oh, boyhood friend. Yes.”

There’s a pause.

Then, “Oh, how rude of me. I do quite enjoy having a human mind in here with my own, it’s so very enjoyable, feeling them squirm. And we’re going to spending such an awful lot of time together and I haven’t even introduced myself yet.”

His body moves, and Stiles watches as he’s taken to the mirror in the corner of his room. It’s his reflection, his face, but then he blinks, and his eyes are pitch black. He grins, head tilting.

“Hi, there,” he says, and inside his own head Stiles winces. “I’m the new you.”

-0-

Derek gets out of his piss poor excuse for a shower—the first step in fixing up the house was the pipes and they’re functional, to say the least—and towels off his hair as he pads out to his bedroom. It’s currently just a mattress on the floor of what used to be his old room, and it’s the least destroyed room in the house, next to the room Isaac sometimes crashes in. It’s not ideal, but it’s a roof and four walls.

He needs to study up on what the thing is, he knows, but he can hear Isaac and Scott downstairs, talking, and the subject matter makes him growl.

“—said he’s already looking it up. Bestiary’s empty of the scent we described and it seems like the scent can disappear into thin air. Stiles is just as confused as we are.”

Isaac snorts. “Well, guess tracking it that way is out of the question.”

Derek is dressed a minute after that, walking down the stairs with his eyes on Scott.

“Did you talk to Stiles?” he asks.

Derek nods. “He’s working. He’ll get back to us.”

Scott looks confused. “Dude, he just called me like five minutes ago. He has a couple leads but none of them stick with the disappearing scent issue. The bestiary is empty, looking online produces too many options, and all of the things he’s found have supposedly been extinct for hundreds of years, never really existed, or only show up in parts of India. He did say that the yellow stuff we found was sulfur, though.”

“Which we already know,” Derek interrupts. He doesn’t ask out loud why Stiles didn’t tell him all of this when he was just there. He thinks he probably knows the answer. “Anything valuable?”

“Well,” Scott continues, trading a glance with Isaac briefly, “Stiles says the memory loss suggest possession. But he isn’t sure what that means.”

Isaac sighs and throws himself down on a chair, because Isaac thinks he's a Labrador and can just heave himself on furniture. “Possession like with exorcism—what else is it going to mean? We need a priest."

He pauses and looks up at the other two. “Do we even have a Catholic church in this place?"

"I really don't know," Scott mumbles.

Derek is too annoyed by the fact that he screwed up with Stiles again, and that his entire pack hangs on the human’s every word like it's law, and he doesn't know how to feel about that. “We don't know what we're dealing with and we're not bringing any more humans into this so go."

Scott and Isaac both blink at him and Isaac runs a hand through his hair. "Go where exactly?"

“Anywhere. Home, lacrosse practice—it doesn’t matter. Just leave. I’ll look up some possession stuff and call you when I know more.” He starts to turn away from them, but Isaac is looking like he isn’t planning on moving a muscle, so he glares. With a heavy sigh, Isaac hoists himself up and stomps towards the front door.

Scott doesn’t move.

Scott is glaring at him with that determined look of his. “Why didn’t Scott tell you?”

Derek looks at him and there’s nothing he can say, nothing that won’t be a lie or an indirect admission of failure.

“I know you were with him,” he says and it’s a rare sight to see Scott look disgusted but he does. “Your scents smelled like swirled together ice cream. Did you really not even give him enough time to speak?”

Derek can feel the judgment coming off Scott in waves. He’s angry. He’s upset. And Derek guesses he has every right to be. Stiles is his best friend and Derek…doesn’t treat him very well.

He clears his throat. “My relationship with Stiles isn’t any of your business.”

“None of my business?! Stiles is my business!” Scott shakes his head, shifts his weight. “Derek, sex isn’t—non-romantic sex can’t—” He breaks off, looking a little sick. “I don’t even know why I’m having to explain this to you. Sex is supposed to be…emotional. And you just—wham, bam, thank you, ma’am.”

“You do know Stiles is a guy, right?”

Scott narrows his eyes. “I’m aware.”

Isaac has been slowly inching away from the other two but Derek catches him just as he’s about to slip out and waves uselessly at Scott. “Take him with you!”

“But you’re having a discussion!”

“This is not a discussion; there’s nothing to discuss, get out of my house.” He shoves Scott towards the door and doesn’t think about how he can’t even bring himself to order them properly as an Alpha should.

Scott glares at him as he follows Isaac out the door, but Derek turns his back. He can’t deal with Scott right now. He has to find a priest.

There are only about a million things that Derek finds that have the capability of possessing humans, and none of them list any strange scents. That’s the trouble, he figures, of being a werewolf. No one gives you the hints you really need.

He’s been staring at his computer screen for at least two hours when he hears the rumble of a familiar engine a couple hundred yards away from the house.

Stiles.

Fuck.

He growls softly to himself, swearing to kill Scott for whatever he said to the boy to make him come running. Stiles wouldn’t have come on his own—he’s passive when he’s upset. He would’ve stayed away. Stupid Scott.

His hands are still poised on his keyboard when Stiles walks in and there's something...different. He wonders if it was the last straw, if he'd stretched the fragile thing they had too far, if the new set of his shoulders is the last bit of something that he needs to get away from Derek and from all this. He wonders if this is when Stiles leaves him.

But instead of all of all that, instead of Stiles saying something biting and horrible and calling it all off, he gives Derek a pointed look and then strips off his jacket, leaving it on the floor. Derek stares because he can’t say anything just yet, not until he knows what the balance of the situation is, and in the time it takes him to blink, Stiles is pulling his shirt up over his head, too.

Derek licks his lips.

Stiles tucks his thumb under his waistband. “Upstairs?” he says, and it sounds like a question but it doesn’t feel like one. It feels like a command.

He's left staring as Stiles starts climbing the stairs. Derek starts after him, coming across his disposed jeans on the steps. He feels a grip in his heart, this wasn't what he'd been expecting and he's trying to wrap his mind around it but he steps into the room and Stiles is nowhere to be found.

He hears running water and a second later Stiles comes out of the bathroom, dressed only in his boxers and carrying lube in his hand. He arches an eyebrow, smirks just slightly. “Took you long enough,” he says. He bites down on his lower lip as he runs his eyes up and down Derek. “Wow.”

Derek blinks. “What?”

Stiles looks up innocently. “Nothing. Just…appreciating.”

“Stiles—what are you doing?”

Stiles smirks, it looks odd and unnatural on his face because something is missing. He walks closer and Derek is still too dumbfounded to react when he leans into his ear and whispers, "Taking."

He walks to the bed, slipping off his boxers as he goes, and Derek thinks he might maybe understand. This could be a new type of anger. That he could understand; he knows how anger twists and changes shape inside of you. If he's honest, things could have been worse than a bit of vindictive sex.

It goes the way Derek expects it to at the beginning and then changes so quickly that Derek swears Stiles is someone new. Derek has seen Stiles angry—this is new, though. Derek doesn’t hate it, he just isn’t used to it. And the way Stiles rides him, like he has something to prove… Well, he’s not exactly going to argue.

Stiles doesn’t talk during, doesn’t babble the way he usually does, and even when they both come, he refrains from kissing Derek like he usually does. He doesn’t grab at Derek’s face, doesn’t pepper kisses across his jaw and slump into his body with exhaustion. No, instead, he lets Derek slip out of him without as much as a hiss of pain and sits up against the wall that acts as headboard to Derek’s mattress.

Derek is still breathing heavily when Stiles stands and begins to walk towards the door.

“Hey—where are you going?” he asks.

Stiles gives a little wave of dismissal. Derek can hear him pad down the stairs of the house, shameless, and rifle through his jeans. Derek can hear cardboard packaging and smell—

What?

Is that…tobacco?

He takes the stairs two at a time and there he is, jeans unbuttoned and a cigarette in his hand.

“Stiles, are you out of your fucking mind?”

The boy just turns and smile at him and it still feels wrong and he hadn’t been sure how badly he’d screwed up until now, because Stiles is… He has no idea what Stiles is doing. He looks at the little paper sliver between his fingers.

“This? This is what you’re worried about? Oh, Derek,” he says, and the name rolls off of Stiles’ tongue like he’s unwrapping it, “you’re a darling one.”

Derek isn’t even sure what to say to that. “Those things will kill you.”

Stiles smirks as he pulls a lighter out of his pocket. “And hanging out with werewolves is so good for my health?”

“Don’t.” Derek wants to reach forward, take the thing from him, but he’s frozen in shock. “Seriously. Stiles, whatever this is—if this is some cry for attention—”

“If I wanted attention,” he says around the death stick between his lips, “I would let you know.”

It terrifies him really; if he's honest with himself Stiles terrifies him all the time, because he's helpless to this. A sudden change and he feels that the rug has been pulled from under his feet. Give him a murderous lizard or a psychotic relative now please, something he can deal with, but not this.

"Aw, look, you're concerned. Is that all it takes? Risking a bit of lung cancer? Oh. There's a slow pleased smile on his red lips. “Wouldn't that be poetic. Going down just like Mom."

Derek blinks. “Stiles. Stop it—whatever you’re doing, stop it right now. I—I’m sorry, okay? About leaving earlier.”

Stiles hums. “No, you’re not.” He takes a drag of the cigarette and then pulls Derek close, kissing him deeply and pushing the smoke into his mouth. Derek pushes him away, coughing and wiping at his lips. Stiles is smiling. “You think you can read me, Derek. But I can read you too. And you’re not sorry at all.”

He turns and burns the cigarette out on the banister that they spent a week restoring. “Pack meeting tomorrow night?”

Derek is still standing there, trying to form words that will make sense. Stiles leans in and wraps an arms around his waist, pulling them flush together. “See you then, Big Bad. Nice doing business with you.”

Derek watches as Stiles ducks to scoop up his T-shirt and jacket on the way out, and he’s still staring at the closed door a couple of minutes later.

What the hell?

-0-

I hope you know that I fucking hate you, you douche bag.

The monster grins to himself. “Oh, Stiles. Such rude language.”

You fucked my boyfriend.

“Boyfriend?” he laughs, and Stiles wants to punch and scream and kick but he just can’t move and he’s so angry. The freak controlling him isn’t helping his anxiety. “Seemed more like a fuck buddy to me.”

Will you stop smoking? Stiles shoves with his head as powerfully as he can, but he doesn’t feel a give. The monster chuckles with his voice. Stiles feels sick.

“Sorry, Little Red.” Stiles watches as his own fingers toss the newly lit cigarette down onto the dirt floor and smash the red tip with the toe of his Converse. “Won’t happen again.”

He’s standing outside Derek’s house, again, and it feels like it’s only been hours since he’s been there. He took a little rest for a while, inside his own head, that was ordained by the resident keeper of his thoughts. When he came to, he was driving.

And so began the argument.

I hope you know he’s gonna kill you. Once he finds out what you did, what you’re doing. Once he figures it out.

“Mm, I wouldn’t be too sure he’s gonna figure it out at all, kid.” His fingers drum lazily on his thighs. “After all, you’re the brains of the operation. Think Mr. Alpha can figure it out on his own for once?”

Shut up. Just…leave. Leave this. Leave us.

“No, I don’t think I will. Trust me, kid. You’re gonna thank me one day.”

And then he begins descending the porch stairs and pushes inside.

He screams the entire meeting, he shouts so much that if he had use of his voice it'd be hoarse. At first he just screams at the monster to stop, to let him out, to shut up, to stop looking at everyone. Then he starts to lose what's left of his mind. He tries to turn to Erica beside him, he pleads with her, Please, Erica. You’re my Catwoman, we have each other's backs, and I need you.

He screams for Scott, he screams that he can't believe no one can tell the difference. He cries when he realizes how true it is. He would know; if it was one of them he would know. He looks at Derek, and yes Derek knows, Derek can tell something is different. Stiles begs. The monster laughs.

He only thinks you're angry, the creature taunts. He only thinks you're being bitchy kid.

Let me go, Stiles demands, feeling like he’s trembling without a body.

Not yet. Maybe not ever.

“Any thoughts, Stiles?” Erica asks then, and Stiles screams, to no avail, Yes, yes, yes—it’s here. It’s in me. It’s me! Don’t—Erica, don’t trust it! Listen to me. Listen to what I’m saying!

But then his voice says, “Not sure yet. I got a little…sidetracked in my research.” There’s a pointed look at Derek then, and Stiles watches as Scott’s fists clench and Isaac appears to make himself smaller. “But we’re working off possession, right?”

Everyone around the table nods and his hand is spinning a pencil instead of tapping it—why has no one noticed that? "Well I mean sounds like it could be, right? People forgetting stuff for spaces of time. But I haven't found anything more solid than Paranormal Activity to back it up." The creature smiles, Erica smiles back.

“We’ll continue research, then,” Derek says after a moment. “And resume updates regularly.”

“Of course,” Stiles hears his voice say. “You know where to find me.”

“Wait, what about the scent?” Everyone stops to look at Boyd, and even Stiles is a little surprised. That’s a good question. Why can’t they smell it? Why can’t they tell that he’s it? Or that…that the thing is him?

Because when I take a body, I take their scent, the monster tells Stiles, and Stiles feels like he’s going to start crying again. Handy, isn’t it? Real useful against werewolves.

The monster hums. “Maybe it’s gone. Maybe it noticed how there was a pack here and left.”

Derek shakes his head. “No. We’re still operating under the theory that it came for us—for the pack.”

“It’s strange, though,” Isaac offers. “It’s been quiet for days. No more victims in town, no more creepy stuff. Nothing’s really out of whack.”

I’m out of whack! Stiles shouts. Me! Pay attention to me!

“We’ll wait,” Derek decides. “And if there’s still no news in a week, the thing’s gone.”

A week, the thing preens, a week and you're mine forever without a second thought. Stiles feels as if he's been backed into a corner of his mind. He huddles there and tries to keep himself together, he counts his memories like precious gold and begs the others to realize, to see that he's not really there. Then the thought strikes him, why is the creature really there? What did it want with them?

Oh, Little Red, the thing says, I haven't even decided yet.

-0-

It’s another two days before he realizes, before it all clicks. Scott’s in the house, combing through the library, when he storms in and says, “I know what it is.” He doesn’t wait for Scott’s response, just picks up a printed blog entry and reads it out loud. “’Demons are often described as being clouds of black smoke that can enter a human body and inhabit it forcefully. They take over the body, use it, and it can control the human’s mind, blocking it out from everything it’s doing.’”

Scott blinks at him, holding the pieces of paper Derek’s given him with limp hands. “Um. Okay?”

Derek stares at him expectantly and when his facial expression doesn’t change, he simply shakes his head. “They’re spawns of Lucifer. And they can’t really be killed, not with anything we have. But if we trap them in a Devil’s Trap and exorcise them, they get sent back to Hell.” He does a half shrug. “Theoretically.”

“Exorcise? Like in…the movie?”

Derek sighs. “Pack meeting tonight. Make sure Stiles is there too—and Allison. We’ll go through the bestiary, see if there’s anything on them now that we know what we’re looking for.”

“Can demons possess werewolves?” Scott asks then, and Derek is kind of surprised at the question.

All the same, he shrugs. “I don’t see why not. But then again, we’re not really human, are we?”

And he leaves it at that.

He has a dozen cans of spray paint, a few bags of road salt, and the rosary is dropped in the water, just waiting for the Latin chant. Derek is prepared. He’s confident in his analysis of their problem—believes he’s correct in thinking it’s a demon and that’s it’s still around, no matter what Stiles may think—and, since he can’t reach Stiles no matter how hard he tries, he’s taken some precautions.

The Latin is stupid. He considers asking Lydia for help, but he doesn’t particularly want to have to deal with Jackson’s irrational jealousy—not even towards Lydia spending time with the pack, but towards the pack wanting to include Lydia. It’s complicated.

Scott’s returns a little while later, armed with iron, another book in Latin, and some myths about demons, and Derek starts to think it’s kind of strange. Normally Stiles would be all over this kind of stuff, getting into it, begging them to let him help. He should be excited that they figured out what the thing was. It’s…weird. And terrible. Because Derek knows Stiles’ distance is his own fault.

“I couldn’t reach Stiles,” Scott says in greeting when he walks in the front door of the Hale house. “I dropped by his place and his dad said he went to the library. Probably more research.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Derek picks up a can of spray paint and hands it off to Scott. “Here,” he says, “make yourself useful. One of these things in front of the doorstep of the backdoor.” He gives Scott an extra copy of a drawing he did up, the Devil’s Trap with easy lines and complicated symbols. “Carefully. Don’t mess up.”

Scott frowns. “How exactly is this thing supposed to keep out a demon?”

Derek simply glares.

“Right,” Scott mutters, walking away. “Going.”

It’ll be at least another two hours before anyone from the pack shows up. Lydia is “tutoring” Jackson, Allison is with her father, and Derek sent Erica, Boyd, and Isaac to do the rounds and see what else they could find on the possession front. For now, it’s just him and Scott.

When he’s painted a Devil’s Trap in the doorway, Derek settles in front of the laptop Boyd left in the house. He figures as long as Stiles isn’t pitching in, he might as well figure out some more things on his own.

Trapping Your Demon—

The age of the demon is usually a deciding factor. An older demon will know tricks—like painting the trap on the ceiling so it doesn’t actually walk over it, or hiding it under a carpet—while a younger one may fall prey to them. Be advised, demons are angry when they’re tricked, and still powerful when trapped.

And farther down the page:

One of the most important things to remember: demons lie.

There’s a spiel attached about how demons tell the truth sometimes, too, if they think it will mess with a person’s head, but Derek keeps scrolling. He only has so much time to make it seem like he knows what he’s doing.

After he figures all of this out, he has to find where the thing is, too. It’s waiting, Derek knows, and sooner or later it’s going to come out and attack. He just has to figure out when. Follow the signs. Trace the footsteps. They’d tried connecting the victims, the older gentleman, the young girl, and the middle-aged mom librarian, and ended up with nothing. But maybe a second glance…

Derek goes upstairs for what can’t be longer than five minutes, but when he comes back downstairs, he finds Stiles and Scott in the middle of a conversation. He doesn’t think twice about not hearing Stiles come in.

“Did you get the texts?” Derek asks.

Stiles looks at him too quickly. His gaze is lined with hesitation, and Derek can sense something like impatience in the air. “Yes,” Stiles says simply. Derek can feel the ice in his voice. He’s still angry. “I put my phone on silent when I was in the library—and then I just decided to head over here.” He jerks his head towards the front door. “Nice paint job. Really brightens up the place.”

“Demon trap.”

Scott stands there, observing them like he’s waiting for one of them to explode, and Stiles is watching Derek like he’s a science experiment. There’s something that shoots up Derek’s spine—a momentary scent that makes his wolf snap to attention—and he narrows his eyes, because, no, this isn’t right.

“How do you know it’s a demon?” Stiles asks.

“Process of elimination.”

Stiles cocks his head. “Wow,” he says, and he no longer sounds as calm as he did. Instead, he sounds biting. “You guys really never say thank you, do you?”

Scott blinks. He shifts his weight from foot to foot, glances at Derek, and then looks back at Stiles. “What?”

“He does all this research. All the time. He barely sleeps, what with school and the werewolf meetings, and how he’s so busy being your pack’s personal encyclopedia and caretaker.” Stiles snorts, hunches his shoulders, and sticks his hands in his pockets. “You guys never even bother to thank him.”

Scott looks more and more confused by the second.

“Thank who?” he asks. He sounds worried, like he thinks Stiles is having a nervous breakdown.

And then Stiles blinks. When his eyelids opens, his eyes are black, not a trace of white to be found; and Derek takes an immediate step forward, growling in the back of his throat.

Of course. Of fucking course—because it always ends up this way, doesn’t it? They always go after Stiles.

“Calm down, wolfy,” Stiles—who isn’t actually Stiles—says, blinking away the black.

“Who are you?” Scott asks, and Derek can sense the fear in his voice.

He laughs. It’s cold, and it sends a chill through the air. “Oh, you can just call me Stiles.”

“Get out of him,” Derek demands. “Now.”

“I don’t think so—I like it quite a lot in here. The self-hatred, the low self-esteem, the sarcasm. It’s a demon’s paradise.”

Scott’s brain clicks. “Demon. You—you’re the demon.”

“He finally got it!” Stiles coos, grinning. “Well done, Scotty. But you were always the slow one, right?”

Derek takes a threatening step forward. “How’d you get in?”

“Little trick.” Stiles lifts his hand, snaps his fingers, and reappears a couple of steps away. “Fun demon thing.”

Derek growls. Stiles simply keeps smiling.

“Now,” he says patiently, “I know what you’re thinking. But the thing is, no matter what’s happening on the inside, this is still Stiles’ body. And guess what?” He grins maliciously. “He’s in here with me.”

In that moment, it feels like everything stops. Instead of just Stiles’ body being taken hostage, it’s Stiles, too. Stiles is still there, inside himself with the demon, and they have no way of communicating with him, no way of listening to him. They’re trapped against a corner without an exit strategy.

“He’s feisty,” Stiles’ voice continues. “Keeps yelling at me about how you two are going to rip me to shreds, no matter what I tell you. But he’s wrong. Because you two like Stiles too much, isn’t that right?” He elongates his sentences, speaks slowly and clearly, with emphasis. He needs to make sure they listen. “Every scratch you make, every stab, every bite—Stiles feels all of it. And I get off on it.” He actually seems a little delighted by the thought, like it would be fun for him. He spreads his arms out wide in a welcoming gesture. “So, c’mon,” he challenges. “Hurt Stiles. You always do.”

“Shut up.” Derek is growing less human with every word from Stiles’ mouth.

“It’s true. You know it.”

He does, actually, which is the worst part of it all, but adding to the demon’s fuel isn’t going to help—they need a plan. His mind races through books and websites and victims, but everything is being taken over by the singular word that keeps running through his head.

Stiles. Stiles. Stiles.

Protect Stiles. 

Yeah, protect him. Wasn’t he supposed to have done that before? And now it’s too late.

“You use him all the time,” Stiles continues, interrupting Derek’s thoughts. “You take him for granted. Never thank him. Never really appreciate him. And how many times has he taken bullets meant for you? How many times has he gone out his way to help you all and then gotten himself hurt because of it?”

The question hangs in the air, floating menacingly, and Stiles scoffs when he doesn’t receive an answer.

“It’s your fault,” he says.

The scathing remark is actually dropped quite calmly, without emphasis or force. Calm. Just a statement. Just a fact. And it lands like a sturdy punch to the chest.

Derek takes a step backwards.

“What do you want?” Derek asks.

“Nothing. Not anymore. I’m just going to leave.”

Derek blinks.

Stiles arches an eyebrow. “Oh, sorry. I guess I wasn’t clear. I’m the best thing to ever happen to this kid, you know. I can make him confident, make him do exactly what he wants. So I’m going to leave. With Stiles’ body.”

“You can’t do that!” Scott protests. “He’s our friend!”

“Hell of a way to treat your friend—bossing him around, screwing him over.” He turns to Derek. “Or just screwing him, isn’t that right, Derek Hale?” Stiles looks him up and down, the pleased smile still firmly on his lips. “Sneaking in his window at night, leaving before sunrise. Like I said—using him.”

“That’s not fair.” Scott is twitchy, nervous, but he sounds sure. “Derek loves him.”

“Now, now, Scott. Don’t speak for your Alpha. It’s just bad manners.”

There’s obviously an inner war raging inside of Derek, and it just makes Stiles smile. He watches Derek squirm—not visibly, never visibly—and then looks to Scott for a reaction, but the younger werewolf is watching Derek, too.

“See?” Stiles says finally. “And Stiles knows it, too. He knows that you use him, that you’ve been using him, and he still hangs around you. He still wants to help you. Why do you think that is?”

“We get it, okay?” Scott barks. “But all of us know that Stiles is important to the pack—he does too much for us. We know that. But we also know that Stiles doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to.”

Stiles cocks his head. “Unless someone he loves asks him to.”

Derek lunges at that, moving so quickly that Scott can barely see him as he soars through the air. In a blink, Derek has Stiles shoved up against the opposite wall, wrists pinned.

All at once, Stiles’ face goes from smug and pleased straight to terrified. It’s in the blink of an eye. So fast that, for a moment, it’s kind of convincing.

“Derek,” he says, his voice softer. “Derek—Derek, it’s me—don’t—Derek, don’t hurt me—please, Derek.”

“Don’t play games with me!” He grabs Stiles’ shoulders, pulling them away from the wall and then shoving them back. He’s completely in Stiles’ face, threatening, monstrous. “I will kill you,” he says, and it’s a promise. “I will rip you out of him.”

“Derek,” Stiles sobs. “Derek—it’s me! Derek, he’s gone.”

Derek jerks backwards like he’s been stung. “What?”

There’s a two second interval—that’s how everything feels, like it’s all going too fast, too much—before Derek goes soaring through the air, back colliding with the far wall and crumpling to the ground with a groan.

Stiles looks vastly unimpressed. “I could kill everyone in this town with that trick. One look at Stiles’ big, brown eyes and they’d be putty in my hand.” He doesn’t even look over at Scott before flicking his hand in the boy’s general direction, sending him flying through the air. He lands somewhere in the kitchen, Derek thinks.

“Killing Stiles won’t get rid of me. But you already knew that, didn’t you, Derek?”

“You’re disgusting,” Derek spits, struggling to sit up.

“Flattery won’t get you anywhere.” Stiles makes a humming noise in the back of his throat as he strolls around the room. He pauses at the edge of the Devil’s Trap, smiling again. “Derek, Derek, Derek.” As he skirts around the edge of the paint like it’s a game, he says, “You know the worst thing about all of this? Stiles isn’t even scared for himself. In between telling me how hard you’re going to kick my ass back to Hell, he’s threatening me.” The laugh that comes out of Stiles’ mouth is dark. “He doesn’t want you to get hurt.”

Derek clenches his jaw.

“He loves you—and you repay him like this? By using him, by never appreciating him?” He scoffs. “If I were him, I never would’ve let you near me.” He grins. “But then again, I’m not him. And you do have some redeeming qualities. After all, you’re not a bad fuck.”

Derek feels a little sick. Because it makes sense—Stiles acting that way, Stiles being cold and casual. Stiles smoking. It makes sense. And it makes Derek feel like the worst person in the world.

Derek wants to say something, is ready to say something, when he realizes. Stiles has stepped closer. He’s only about a yard away from Derek now, and he’s standing over the ugly carpet that Isaac had dragged in as a house-warming gift.

Derek smiles.

It takes a second for realization to cross over Stiles’ features. When it does, it’s quickly replaced with anger.

“You didn’t,” he says, low and dangerous.

“Oh,” Derek laughs as he stands up. “I did.”

In one swift move, the carpet is whipped across the room, sending Stiles onto his ass, right in the middle of the Devil’s Trap.

Stiles closes his eyes, his jaw tight and his frustration evident. “Great. This again. Hell sucks, you know. It’s not exactly a picnic, even for us.”

“Send us a postcard.” With deliberate steps, Derek reaches the table where he left the Latin book, and picks it up, eyes scanning the page carefully.

“Everything I said is true, you know.”

Derek begins the incantation, his voice powerful.

“Stiles does too much for you. He puts up with too much. Why do you think that is?”

Derek walks in a circle around the trapped demon, still speaking clearly, and when he’s gotten a dozen words down, he notices Stiles’ head jerk in an uncomfortable direction.

A loud gasp is ripped from Stiles’ throat as the demon twitches inside of the warm, human body. “He loves you,” the creature manages to shout, hoarse and strained. “Won’t tell you because he doesn’t want to burden you—bullshit, I think. But the other things he puts up with, too. Scott, Allison, Lydia—he loves all of them just as much.” He screams towards the ceiling, shaking as Derek continues. “He does everything for you! And all you do is hurt him!”

Derek finishes the chant with a crescendo to his voice, and Stiles flops backwards, his mouth opening. Black smoke pours out of him thickly, pooling and disappearing into the painted trap. When it’s over—when it’s really over—Derek can’t honestly believe it.

He drops the book. He blinks at the scene before him.

Stiles, spread on his back, eyes closed. Scott, a few feet away, still unconscious from his blow to the wall. Extra supplies on the table across the room.

And it all just hits him at once, hits him so powerfully that he actually falls to his knees.

He doesn’t really know what he’s doing. Not as much as he pretends to.

He needs Stiles. He needs his pack. He needs help.

But he’s never been brave enough to admit it.

He cleans everything up methodically. Lifts Stiles, carries him to his bed and leaves him there. Splashes cold water on Scott to rouse him, sends him home with an order to make sure he lets everyone know the pack meeting is canceled.

Derek can’t handle anything else tonight.

Not yet.

-0-

When Stiles wakes up, he’s in his own bed in his own house.

He’s warm, and comfortable, but he’s wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt and he still has too many hours of unfinished homework sitting on his desk. He wants to think it’s all a dream—wants to be able to think about homework and nothing but homework—but he can’t.

Because he’d been there the whole time. Listening. Watching. Feeling.

And… He needs to find Derek.

Derek meets him out on the porch. If Stiles is being honest, the guy looks like a mess. He’s got bags under his eyes, his hair is out of place—and if that weren’t enough to tip Stiles off, Derek hugs him. Like, actually hugs him. Holds him close, and kisses his temple, leans on Stiles like he’s a rock.

“Are you okay?” Derek whispers into his hair.

“Yeah—yeah, I’m fine.”

Derek leans back just a bit and he looks like he’s battling himself, like he’s debating whether or not to do something, so Stiles just leans in and kisses him. Derek whines softly into his mouth, holding him tighter.

“I don’t deserve you,” Derek tells him.

“Shut up. You’re such a masochist.”

“I mean it.” He keeps one arm wrapped around Stiles’ waist as he steps back again. “Honestly, I… I don’t deserve you.”

“Derek, I… I just kind of want to move on, you know?” Stiles licks his lips. “I appreciate the sentiment—but I don’t want to talk about it.”

Derek pulls him into the house and walks away from him and Stiles feels cold, like it’s wrong, like Derek shouldn’t be walking away. But it’s nothing new.

“Let’s just…make sure to have the whole damn town cleaned of unholy spirits or whatever and move on. You’re all idiots for not asking Mrs. McCall about finding a priest. Just because she hasn’t gone to church since she baptized Scott doesn’t mean I haven’t seen the embarrassing pictures, okay?”

Derek nods sullenly. “We’re not any good without you, Stiles. You know that.”

“But now it’s over and I’m back and everything’s okay. So.” He goes up behind Derek and kisses the base of his neck. “It’s fine.”

Derek shakes his head. “No. It’s not.”

Stiles steps away and takes one deep breath. “It’s not?”

Derek doesn’t turn to look at him, just says his name low and broken.

“What, Derek?” Stiles sighs. “You aren’t actually going to pay attention to what it said.”

Derek keeps his voice soft and even. “I won’t if you tell me it was lying.”

And Stiles doesn’t really know how to respond. Because when he thinks about it, the demon wasn’t exactly lying. Except—

“It’s not your fault,” Stiles says. “It’s… It’s not anybody’s fault.”

“We use you, though. We always have. And you let us.”

“No—I—I like helping. I mean, I feel… I guess…”

Derek nods. “Exactly.”

So Stiles gets angry, because he doesn't care for politeness, it's being dismissed that he can't stand. "No. Okay, no, shut up. I don't need please and thank you this is not kindergarten. I help keep you alive because I have to, because when someone dies it's not them who has to feel the fucking pain, alright? I don't want to feel that again. So, yeah I don't actually give a shit whether or not you realize I don't sleep much or whatever and it might suck when you roll over and put your pants on like you're paying by the hour but I'm a big boy and I can deal with it so just stop. Stop with your man pain, stop with the sulking, not everything is about your inability to have feelings, Derek."

He sets his shoulders and turns to leave—because he really doesn’t want to watch Derek be a martyr—when Derek says, “So what else was it honest about, then?”

“Derek.”

“Are you in love with me?”

Today he’s going to be at least half a coward because he deserves it, he’s had a rough week. So he doesn’t turn around. “You know that I am.”

Derek releases a shuddering breath. “No. I… I didn’t. Well, I thought. But you never said it. So I convinced myself you weren’t. Feeling things. For me.”

“I’ve always felt things for you, you asshole.”

“So why didn’t you say anything?”

Stiles scoffs. “Oh, gee, I don’t know. Maybe because I’m just that stupid kid who fawns over you all the time. It was practically a religious experience losing my virginity to you, and then you treated me like a boy toy so I thought, hm, maybe I probably shouldn’t tell him how I’m losing my shit over him—it might not end well.”

"Stiles."

"You're going to wear my fucking name out, stop being emotional. It's weird. Just because you feel guilty that I got used as a meat suit doesn't mean you have to start buying me flowers and feeding me lines." He finally turns to look at him and Derek seems to have been struck in the head with wooden beam. "I'm in love with you, Derek. Yes, with the same stupid intensity that little 10-year-old me once loved Lydia Martin. Only it's different, because sometimes you kiss me and I get to pretend you love me too. But I'm not 10 years old, I can control my fantasies, I can recognize when people want different things. So keep fucking me or don't, just let me feel what I feel."

“You think I don’t…” Derek clenches his fists, grits his teeth. “You think I don’t feel the same way?”

“Of course you don’t! Have you looked at you? At me? Have you even been paying attention? God.” Stiles shakes his head. “Derek, we want different things. And that’s okay. All relationships end—either you split up or one of you dies—and so why not just enjoy it now, while we’re…this? For now… It’s okay.”

Derek blinks. “You really think I’m that terrible.”

Stiles laughs. “There’s nothing terrible about the conflict between having standards and being horny, Derek.”

And at that, Derek growls. “Did you feel this way the first time?” he demands, and Stiles actually takes half a step back, surprised. “When we were building up to it, when you were still a virgin and I—I was waiting for you, so it could be, so we could have—did you? Did you think the only reason I wanted to fuck you was because I was lonely and horny?”

Stiles doesn’t want to have this conversation, he doesn’t want to say the things he thinks when he’s alone in bed with the feeling of Derek’s hands still on him. Saying things makes them real. But Derek is so angry and so confused and it’s making Stiles confused too.

“Well, you’re hardly going to fuck one of the pack. They…it’d be like forcing them. Look, Derek, we don’t have to do this, we really don’t. You’re not taking advantage of me. You know if sex is the only of you I can have and you’re still having a good time, let’s just…let’s just keep doing that. Please. Don’t make me give that up for useless righteousness.”

“Stiles—you say you’re in love with me and then—” He breaks off, practically vibrating in his skin, and runs his hands through his hair. “So you love me, but you don’t care if it’s not mutual, you just want to have sex. Did I get that right?”

Stiles turns his gaze to his feet and shrugs. “I’ll take what I can get.”

Derek stares. “Who the hell are you, Stiles? Because you’re not you—you’re not. This isn’t—you can’t honestly—what happened to you? What happened to the kid who used to wax poetic about falling in love and having a family? What happened to happiness?”

“I’m happy with you,” Stiles says. “I’m happy with this.”

“No, you’re not! You’re miserable! The other day, when I just up and left without so much as a kiss goodbye, you were pissed. You were angry and upset and I could see that and now—now you’re fine with it? Now you’re okay with a relationship built on sex?”

"It didn't only talk to you, okay?"

He doesn't know why he says it, he doesn't want to think about it, he doesn't want to remember.

"It liked the truth much more than it liked to lie. It liked to tell me how and why things worked this way. How it was better for you to fuck outside the pack until you found someone that could lead with you, someone who would let you turn them. It told me how I'm delusional if I think that we can be like normal dudes who want kids because this isn't about progressive society, you need your genes. So it has a time stamp, so I'm giving up the dream, but I don't want to give you up. Not until you get rid of me."

Derek feels like his knees are just going to give out, like he’s just going to fall over, because no. No, this isn’t okay. After what Stiles has been through, he doesn’t deserve to have that thrown on his plate too. So Derek goes towards him without waiting for permission and pulls him into a hug.

“Demons lie.”

“It’s not a lie and you know it, so don’t try to tell me it is. You can’t stay with me. I don’t want to be turned. I never will. And I can’t exactly have your babies, Derek. This…will expire. And you’ll find someone like Erica.” Stiles nuzzles into Derek’s shoulder. “For now, though, I’m taking this. Because I deserve it. And I want it. Until you decide you need to move on, I’ll be here.”

"Jesus, Stiles, tell me you don't actually believe all that.” He pulls Stiles’ chin up and looks into his eyes. “Stiles, I... I take from you and I don't give back. I can't let myself...what I feel about you it's only... I want everything. I can't do that to you. You should... you could do so much. You could go so far away from here, but I can't. I want to keep you.” Stiles can't believe Derek's voice is actually breaking. "So much."

Stiles kisses him then, because he can, and he doesn’t fully understand everything that just came out of Derek’s mouth but he gets the gist of it, and he’s happy. He’s happy and he’s scared and he’s worried because Derek can still change his mind. But it’s a risk Stiles is kind of willing to take.

“You shouldn’t want me,” Stiles says. “You’re an Alpha. You need to carry on the lineage.”

“You shouldn’t want me,” Derek teases, smirking. “You’re a human. You need to have a life.”

He kisses Derek again, just to shut the idiot up. “Are you going to stop being a jackass now?”

Derek shakes his head but he’s smiling and it’s Stiles’ favorite thing in the world, that smile. “No, but…I am going to do something.”

“What’s that?”

Derek holds his eyes for a long moment but Stiles can tell this is important so he lets him be a creep and stare. Finally he licks his lips and nods to himself and pulls Stiles closer to him, speaking softly into his ear, "I'm going to give you your place in the pack, if you want it. And there will be no more lack of gratitude because your pack will revere you, and I will... I will show you what you mean to me every day even if I can't say it. And if you want it it's yours."

“…how?” Stiles breathes.

“If you become my mate, formally, then you are the second Alpha of the pack, human or not.”

Stiles grips Derek’s shoulders. “Derek.”

“You don’t have to say yes.”

“You love me. You totally love me.”

Derek tries to back away a few inches. “It’s a lot to ask.”

“No, it’s not,” Stiles says, taking a step forward and following him. “Because you love me.”

Derek runs his thumb over Stiles’ bottom lip and looks at him like he’s air slipping away. “Stiles.”

“I need you to,” Stiles tells him. “Derek, I need you to…”

“I love you.” He says it in a rush and then hides himself at the bend of the boy’s neck, his lips pressed to the skin and repeating the words silently.

Stiles thinks he might cry. But instead, he just wraps Derek up in his arms and stands there, holding him, because everything’s going to work out. Because Derek loves him.

They stand there for what feels like hours. Derek lifts his head eventually a kisses Stiles gently. He mumbles something against his lips and Stiles laughs, “Yeah, you idiot. I’m yours.”


End file.
